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Lt.-Gen. Pierre St. Amand appears as a witness at a commons national defence committee in Ottawa on Thursday, Sept. 14, 2017. The committee is hearing witnesses on Canada's abilities to defend itself and our allies in the event of an attack by North Korea on the North American continent. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)

A senior Canadian defence official told a business crowd in Banff that North America is "a bit less secure" than it once was as new threats are posed by violent extremist groups, the behaviour of certain countries and the advent of long-range missiles.

Lt.-Gen. Pierre St-Amand, the deputy commander of North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD), said the 59-year-old organization is modernizing in the face of these threats, looking at physical assets, such as ships and aircraft, as well as its strategies and tactics.

"Capabilities that are being developed are opening flanks that we’re not very comfortable with, and we have to start thinking about our future in that sense," St-Amand said during the Global Business Forum at the Fairmont Banff Springs.

In an era of rising rhetorical warfare between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korea, St-Amand made headlines last week when he gave a House of Commons committee a blunt assessment of what would happen if an intercontinental ballistic missile was heading for a Canadian city.

"We're being told in Colorado Springs that the extant U.S. policy is not to defend Canada," St-Amand told the committee, convened to consider threats posed by North Korea.

He said "in the heat of the moment," American commanders may choose to defend its northern neighbour, "but that would entirely be a U.S. decision."

During the same hearing, however, MPs heard testimony that Canada does not appear to face any threat from North Korea, which was said to view this country as "peaceful and friendly."

The Canadian government decided not to join the U.S. ballistic missile defence shield in 2005. Still, U.S. Defence Secretary Jim Mattis said after St-Amand's testimony that Washington stands by its northern neighbour.

"They were there when we got attacked. We stand by them," Mattis said, according to a report by U.S. News.

St-Amand was not made available for an interview after his speech in Banff, but a NORAD spokesman said the military command is "focused on our relationship" with the U.S., which he called "very strong and very long-lasting."

"Ultimately, it's a U.S. decision whether to shoot down any missile," Maj. Andrew Hennessy said. "Canada really doesn't have a decision or a position on that because we're not party to North American ballistic missile defence."

Established in 1958, NORAD provides aerospace warning and control, along with ocean-level warning, of threats against North America. St-Amand told the crowd Thursday that when ballistic missiles are launched anywhere in the world, NORAD is involved in identifying, tracing and characterizing any potential threat, but not responding to it.

"This is where we have no part to play," he said, "but we are not outside the room. We are still at our consoles, and we keep watching because there could be some more coming in."

In the latest round of rhetoric in a tense nuclear standoff, Trump warned this week the U.S. will destroy North Korea if necessary, while Kim Jung Un responded that the "mentally deranged" American president "will pay dearly" for his remarks, according to media reports.

During his speech, St-Amand said NORAD has been forced to re-examine itself with the advent of new threats, including extremist groups and what he called "state behaviours."

"Because of these new capabilities — long-range cruise missiles, for example that can be air launched, and launched from the (sea) — we feel that North America is a bit less secure than it was a short time ago," said St-Amand, Canada's highest-ranking officer at NORAD.

St-Amand didn't delve into these "state behaviours," but said they were well covered by other speakers at the Banff conference, including Christopher Hill, a four-time U.S. ambassador who led an American delegation on international talks about North Korea's nuclear program in the late 2000s.

Hill provided a prescription for dealing with the "tiny" Asian country that has been conducting increasingly provocative missile tests. He suggested keeping the door open for negotiations, sticking with its ally South Korea and working with China to diffuse the North Korean threat.

"We really do need to work with the Chinese, and that doesn't mean tweeting them in the dead of night or issuing some public statements that kind of push them into a corner," Hill said.